The present invention relates to an initialization method for a channel controller and, more specifically, to an initialization method for a channel controller wherein addresses of the various control data areas in the main memory used by the channel controller are written into the local memory in the channel controller itself upon initialization.
Since a channel controller works using plural control data areas in the main memory, the address of each of the areas is required to be written into the local memory of said channel controller. The prior art initialization technique to satisfy this requirement is found in the British Pat. No. 1,548,497, in which the method for initializing the firmware module of a data processing device is shown.
Furthermore, the prior art method for address generation is disclosed in the U.S. Pat. No. 3,839,706, in which the means for translating the virtual command address of a channel program to a real memory address is shown for computer employing a virtual memory and/or paging system.
It seems that the above requirement can be satisfied by combining the forementioned initialization and address generation methods. However, due to the fundamental properties of a virtual memory and/or paging system, the combination causes address translation complications, with the result that the time taken for initialization is prolonged. Also, there is another drawback in that the number of the steps of the microprogram and the necessary hardware increases. On the other hand, since the memory capacity required for the control data area is generally small, the address setting by way of a virtual memory and/or paging system is hardly necessary.